UK finally pardons computer pioneer Alan Turing

Associated Press ^ | Dec 24, 2013 8:43 AM EST | Raphael Satter

[Olog-hai]

Britain has tried to make good by one of its most famous sons, posthumously pardoning Alan Turing for a gay sex conviction which tarnished the brilliant career of the code breaker credited with helping win the war against Nazi Germany and laying the foundation for the computer age.

One author said he hoped Tuesday’s symbolic act—the famous mathematician committed suicide more than 50 years ago—would send a message to countries such as India and Russia, where gays can still be prosecuted for expressing their sexuality.

Others say the pardon doesn’t go far enough, noting that thousands of others shared in Turing’s humiliation in the years during which Britain criminalized homosexual behavior. …

[Cowboy Bob]

The article is full of lies.

Can the author please explain for me: what is “Gay Sex?” I can’t quite picture what it means.

[Pearls Before Swine]

Well, that’s helpful.

[Neoliberalnot]

Hogwash. Turing was one of a thousand scientists on the project. The actual code braking machine Collusus was built in the US. The queers try to claim every great person was actually a closet homo. Regardless, doing a good work does not give one a license to be a degenerate and uncivilized animal.

[Drew68]

Can the author please explain for me: what is “Gay Sex?” I can’t quite picture what it means.

Google is your friend. Select images. Make sure you disable "safe search".

[Bobalu]

Colossus was built by Tommy Flowers, an engineer of the British telephone system. He followed the design suggested by Turing in his 1936 paper "On computable numbers, with an application to the Entscheidungsproblem"

That paper is one of the most important scientific papers ever written.

Turing was on a par with scientific greats like Newton and Einstein.

The Colossus was certainly NOT constructed or designed in the US...lol

The work at Blechley Park was kept secret for so long that it clouded the true history of computing...some facts are still secret.

Turing was later the key man on a team that created the worlds first programmable electronic computer with stored program... The Manchester Baby. also created in the UK.

Alan Turing

Tommy Flowers

The Manchester Baby

[Mastador1]

Can the author please explain for me: what is “Gay Sex?” I can’t quite picture what it means.

I don’t know but I’m pretty sure it’s something the upper class and royals in Britain have been practicing forever.

[concentric circles]

While the AP story mentions suicide, it is more likely that his death was caused by the accidental inhaling of cyanide fumes from electroplating he was doing at home. See this story from the BBC, Alan Turing: Inquest's suicide verdict 'not supportable'.

[Bayard]

Aha! The simple question which reveals the preconceptions we’ve embraced in our contraceptive culture.

The definition of sex has changed when the mindset that procreation is no longer connotative to the act.

Your philosophical truths are at odds with our deceptive culture, which wants to claim what is untrue true and that all things are known by what what is convenient.

[Neoliberalnot]

I was thinking the units in series were actually built in the US near the end of the war. The UK had the advantage since they captured the German coding machine. Several early computers were already in existence in the US. Sorry for the error.

[Olog-hai]

Gotta dig deeper and ask what the word “sex” really means. Freudian distortions permeate the “culture” or what’s left of it.

[Mach9]

Actually, Polish mathematicians (including Rejewski in ‘32)—far more prescient about Germany’s aims than anyone in the UK—pioneered the decryption process Turin and many others eventually improved.

[dfwgator]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marian_Rejewski

[Bobalu]

Yes, in the upper left corner of this graphic are listed the three brilliant Polish Maths wizards that contributed so much.

It should be mentioned that a young Mathematician named Bill Tutte recreated the German Tunny machine by working backward from the encrypted messages sent by the machine... a truly remarkable feat since that machine was far more complex than Enigma.